Real birds in imagined gardens: Mughal painting between Persia and Europe

Uittreksel

"Mughal painting is said to have begun in the mid-16th century as an offshoot of Persian painting. Within a few decades, however, Mughal art was transformed by European Renaissance art. Most accounts of Mughal painting trace a straightforward "evolutionary" path, with Mughal artists abandoning the Persianate style in favor of a European one. But in her essay, Singh demonstrates that the history of Mughal painting is by no means linear. During the reigns of the emperors Akbar (1556-1605) and Jahangir (1605-27), Mughal painting underwent repeated cycles of adoption, rejection, revival of both Persian and European styles. Singh suggests that the adoption and rejection of these styles was motivated as much by aesthetic interest as by court politics. By methodically unraveling this entangled history of politics and style, Singh explores new ways of understanding the significance of naturalism and stylization in Mughal art."--Publisher.